Water watchdog boss claimed £170 Mulberry wallet on expenses

The earlier Audit Scotland report had revealed how a senior manager at Wics had an £80,000 Harvard Business School course paid for her, while others completed MBA courses costing £70,000.

That prompted the Scottish government to commission another review of spending and governance at Wics, which included consultants Ernst & Young going through the expense claims line-by-line.

They found that between October 2018 and June 2023, Mr Sutherland submitted 28 “bulk uploads” of expenses which ranged between £190 and more than £21,329.

He also signed off a business class flight from New Zealand – worth more than £18,159 – for the director of corporate and international affairs and her spouse.

The report noted: “While we understand from interviews that both were living in New Zealand at the time, it is not usual practice to expense business class travel for spouses and we cannot see evidence that appropriateness and value for money were considered before this was incurred.”

A number of items were found to have “no clear business purpose”, including the £170 wallet and £290 glasses.

The review concluded payment of the expenses showed there was a “poor control and governance environment”.

It also noted there were wide-ranging values for how much could be claimed on working from home expenses, which allowed for desks worth between £100 and £600.